Should Canada Be Preparing for a Destabilized USA?

[Nicko999]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

Our way of life as Canadians has been shaped by immigration though centuries. The idea of discriminating against someone's religious freedom is the antithesis of what it is to be Canadian. I am very against such an idea. What Iran does is completely irrelevant to how we are and to our values.

You can practice your religion without wearing a hijab... see European Muslims (native muslims not immigrants). They don't wear hijabs and in fact live a modern lifestyle (drinking, eating pork, cohabitation without marriage and so on). This doesn't stop them from keeping their religious traditions and celebrating their holidays (like Ramadan).

Nobody will stop those groups from exercising their religious freedom. They just have to adapt a little because they are in a new country. Seems fair.

[Stryker]

Lol so there is a coup on milo.

Basically comments he made quite publicly on the joe roegan podcast "have leaked".

Of course these comments were made a year ago, and they were viewed by millions of people.

Lols this is just hilarious to me. News doesn't get any more fake than that.

[Antigonish]

Originally Posted by Stryker

Lol so there is a coup on milo.

Basically comments he made quite publicly on the joe roegan podcast "have leaked".

Of course these comments were made a year ago, and they were viewed by millions of people.

Lols this is just hilarious to me. News doesn't get any more fake than that.

Yeah it's getting real desperate. The fact it was an excerpt from a conversation about how he was sexually abused when he was 13 makes it even more fucked up. But, live by the troll die by the troll?

I see this as a direct attack to get to Bannon (and Breitbart in general). Something tells me there are more shady stuff from behind the scenes in the political sphere come to light over the next 6-12 months and the "lifers" are trying everything to stop it. Kinda worrying...

[niwell]

Originally Posted by Stryker

Lol so there is a coup on milo.

Basically comments he made quite publicly on the joe roegan podcast "have leaked".

Of course these comments were made a year ago, and they were viewed by millions of people.

Lols this is just hilarious to me. News doesn't get any more fake than that.

Nobody in the real world gives a shit about Milo yabadaba whatever his name is. And if they did who cares because he's a piece of human garbage that only gets listened to because of his accent.

I mean, I guess I slightly respect him for trolling the rubes and making a bunch of money off them.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by Antigonish

Yeah it's getting real desperate. The fact it was an excerpt from a conversation about how he was sexually abused when he was 13 makes it even more fucked up. But, live by the troll die by the troll?
\.

But again lets be very clear, it wasn't a private conversation, it was on the joe rogan podcast, a clip that has probably been viewed 10 million times.

Regardless of joe roegan's "bro" status, the fact is he pretty much one of the biggest and most prolific voices of alternative culture on the internet.

The guy has guests from across the spectrum(scientists, bee headers, etc).

Joe rogan has made mention of support for him multiple times and has gone on record multiple times that the guy clearly has issues(which he never tries to hide)

[esquire]

Originally Posted by someone123

I guess I wasn't clear. My post wasn't about debating whether or not immigration is good for the country, or how much immigration is a good level. Those are valid things to discuss but I think you could write books about them. My point was simply that I don't think pointing out that there used to be immigration to Canada is sufficient to prove that it's still a good idea today.

To put it in broad terms, I was always under the impression that immigration was weapon #1 in our arsenal against falling into the difficult situation that Japan finds itself in, with an aging, declining population and increasingly stagnant economy. In other words, immigration is not some goody two-shoes feel good program, but rather something that is motivated in large part due to sheer national self interest.

[Aylmer]

Indeed. After all, if increasing the population could take jobs away from people, then why aren't we trying to actively reduce the size of our towns and cities? The answer is that people don't just work - they also buy houses, groceries, clothes, open bank accounts, go on vacation, etc. You could say that every additional person takes a job from someone else, but without that population increase, that 'stolen job' might not even exist.

And especially in the context of an ageing population, we need a growing population in order to sustain our services and quality of life. If we really wanted to, we could stop or dramatically curb immigration, but we have to be aware that it would be at the cost of our pensions, healthcare, and economic condition.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by niwell

Nobody in the real world gives a shit about Milo yabadaba whatever his name is. And if they did who cares because he's a piece of human garbage that only gets listened to because of his accent.

I mean, I guess I slightly respect him for trolling the rubes and making a bunch of money off them.

You forgot because he gay, because he's funny, because he has interesting perspectives, he's very smart, because he doesn't give a fuck, because it represents an improvement in right wing politics, because the alt right hates him, because the left hates him. etc.

The fact is this is as fake news as something can get.

They are literally presenting something that happened a year ago as a current event, like millions of people didn't hear that podcast.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Aylmer

Indeed. After all, if increasing the population could take jobs away from people, then why aren't we trying to actively reduce the size of our towns and cities? The answer is that people don't just work - they also buy houses, groceries, clothes, open bank accounts, go on vacation, etc. You could say that every additional person takes a job from someone else, but without that population increase, that 'stolen job' might not even exist.

And especially in the context of an ageing population, we need a growing population in order to sustain our services and quality of life. If we really wanted to, we could stop or dramatically curb immigration, but we have to be aware that it would be at the cost of our pensions, healthcare, and economic condition.

On the other hand, if a high population was so desirable, we'd see the residents of places like Switzerland, Monaco, Norway, etc. attempt to relocate to "greener pastures" countries like China and India. Needless to say, we don't see any such trend.

I expect we'll see a paradigm shift on this for the first time in the history of humanity, eventually entering an era where it becomes accepted that growth (economic, demographic) cannot continue forever. This will cause significant change to lots of things that have become really ingrained into people's mindsets, like the notion of "time value of money", etc. Social services will have to be readjusted - it will be mathematically impossible to let people work a few decades then retire on a pension for a few decades enjoying unlimited healthcare in a model that resembles what we currently have.

[Aylmer]

It's not a question of a small vs big population, it's growth vs contraction.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by lio45

I expect we'll see a paradigm shift on this for the first time in the history of humanity, eventually entering an era where it becomes accepted that growth (economic, demographic) cannot continue forever. This will cause significant change to lots of things that have become really ingrained into people's mindsets, like the notion of "time value of money", etc. Social services will have to be readjusted - it will be mathematically impossible to let people work a few decades then retire on a pension for a few decades enjoying unlimited healthcare in a model that resembles what we currently have.

I agree with this to some degree. I don't think the pyramid scheme of growing the population to inflate asset prices and give older people long, fully-funded retirements is sustainable.

I wish people thought more about income per capita and GDP per capita. During the past year or so Canada has had weak economic growth on the order of 1% annually or less. Population growth is also around 1%. Growth in GDP per capita is therefore ~0.

The good news is that economic growth is derived from at least three things:

1) Population growth, which is obviously unsustainable.
2) Economic cycles and financial schemes (leverage and then deleverage), which past a certain point are bound to be zero sum over the long run.
3) Technological improvement. This is where most of our improved standard of living has come from over the past couple hundred years.

(1) and (2) tend to have big sustainability problems but we can still improve our living standards through (3) even if the population remains the same. Unfortunately, I don't think economies like Canada's are particularly geared toward making (3) happen. Instead, they are mostly focused on (1) and (2). It's easy to get rich through speculation and financial manipulation than it is to get rich by developing new technology.

[Acajack]

Just looking at some graphs, and Canada's GDP growth over the past 25 years has not necessarily been higher than that of western developed countries with stagnant populations like Germany and Japan. (And we also have way more natural resources than they do.)

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Just looking at some graphs, and Canada's GDP growth over the past 25 years has not necessarily been higher than that of western developed countries with stagnant populations like Germany and Japan. (And we also have way more natural resources than they do.)

A lot of developed countries have experienced economic growth and rising living standards without rapidly increasing population. Conversely, population growth has caused environmental and economic strain in many countries.

France had about half as many people in 1800 as it does today. Annual increase of ~0.35.

Here's an article about economic changes and the cost of light: http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38650976

The economist featured in the article estimates that the labour cost of producing light has fallen by a factor of 500,000 during the course of human technological development. Those changes are where our improved standard of living has really come from (and they are what gives us the wiggle room needed to support a larger population).

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

You do realize that O'Leary is very pro-immigration and pro-multiculturalism, right? He's not the Trump of the North that the CBC is painting him as.

He's nothing "of the North", as he basically lives the States. He has no business to be in the running for a shot as PM of Canada.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by whatnext

He's nothing "of the North", as he basically lives the States. He has no business to be in the running for a shot as PM of Canada.

That's something I can agree with. As a non-resident of Canada he should be disqualified from the CPC leadership race.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

A lot of developed countries have experienced economic growth and rising living standards without rapidly increasing population. Conversely, population growth has caused environmental and economic strain in many countries.

France had about half as many people in 1800 as it does today. Annual increase of ~0.35.

Here's an article about economic changes and the cost of light: http://www.bbc.com/news/business-38650976

The economist featured in the article estimates that the labour cost of producing light has fallen by a factor of 500,000 during the course of human technological development. Those changes are where our improved standard of living has really come from (and they are what gives us the wiggle room needed to support a larger population).

Much (maybe most) of Canada's prosperity in recent years has been related to non-innovative low-hanging fruit like immigration driving the growth of the domestic goods market and real estate, and also the harvesting of raw materials and natural resources.

[The Macallan]

Originally Posted by Stryker

You forgot because he gay, because he's funny, because he has interesting perspectives, he's very smart, because he doesn't give a fuck, because it represents an improvement in right wing politics, because the alt right hates him, because the left hates him. etc.

The fact is this is as fake news as something can get.

They are literally presenting something that happened a year ago as a current event, like millions of people didn't hear that podcast.

Your post is nonsense. This is not being presented as something that has just happened. The man has come to wider public notoriety because of the new president. People have researched his record as a result of his notoriety. They came up with this dismaying sequence. CPAC, a conservative group, "disinvited" him and it became news. You act as if the timing of what he said is more important than the content of what he said.

[Architype]

Originally Posted by Stryker

You forgot because he gay, because he's funny, because he has interesting perspectives, he's very smart, because he doesn't give a fuck, because it represents an improvement in right wing politics, because the alt right hates him, because the left hates him. etc.

...

No, some people are just freaking attention seeking assholes. If he had anything useful to say, he blew it already. Not much need to analyse any further in this case.

[Stryker]

Random shower thought, are people aware of how trumps muslim ban only focuses on a small fraction of the worlds muslims?

To me it's obvious but one has to wonder.

[Stryker]

Originally Posted by Architype

No, some people are just freaking attention seeking assholes. If he had anything useful to say, he blew it already. Not much need to analyse any further in this case.

So who in popular media isn't an attention seeking asshole?